In Firebase when using push() How do I pull the un

Question

I'm attempting to add/remove entries from a Firebase database. I want to list them in a table to be added/modified/removed (front end) but I need a way to uniquely identify each entry in order to modify/remove. Firebase adds a unique identifier by default when using push(), but I didn't see anything referencing how to select this unique identifier in the API documentation. Can this even be done? Should I be using set() instead so I'm creating the unique ID?

I've put this quick example together using their tutorial:

<div id='messagesDiv'></div>
<input type='text' class="td-field" id='nameInput' placeholder='Name'>
<input type='text' class="td-field" id='messageInput' placeholder='Message'>
<input type='text' class="td-field" id='categoryInput' placeholder='Category'>
<input type='text' class="td-field" id='enabledInput' placeholder='Enabled'>
<input type='text' class="td-field" id='approvedInput' placeholder='Approved'>
<input type='Button' class="td-field" id='Submit' Value="Revove" onclick="msgRef.remove()">

<script>
var myDataRef = new Firebase('https://unique.firebase.com/');

  $('.td-field').keypress(function (e) {
    if (e.keyCode == 13) {
      var name     = $('#nameInput').val();
      var text     = $('#messageInput').val();
      var category = $('#categoryInput').val();
      var enabled  = $('#enabledInput').val();
      var approved = $('#approvedInput').val();
      myDataRef.push({name: name, text: text, category: category, enabled: enabled, approved: approved });
      $('#messageInput').val('');
    }
  });
  myDataRef.on('child_added', function(snapshot) {
    var message = snapshot.val();
    displayChatMessage(message.name, message.text, message.category, message.enabled, message.approved);
  });
  function displayChatMessage(name, text, category, enabled, approved, ) {
    $('<div/>').text(text).prepend($('<em/>').text(name+' : '+category +' : '+enabled +' : '+approved+ ' : ' )).appendTo($('#messagesDiv'));
    $('#messagesDiv')[0].scrollTop = $('#messagesDiv')[0].scrollHeight;
  };
</script>

Now lets assume I have three rows of data:

fred : 1 : 1 : 1 : test message 1
fred : 1 : 1 : 1 : test message 2
fred : 1 : 1 : 1 : test message 3

How do I go about uniquely identifying row 2?

in the Firebase Database they look like this:

-DatabaseName
    -IuxeSuSiNy6xiahCXa0
        approved: "1"
        category: "1"
        enabled: "1"
        name: "Fred"
        text: "test message 1"
    -IuxeTjwWOhV0lyEP5hf
        approved: "1"
        category: "1"
        enabled: "1"
        name: "Fred"
        text: "test message 2"
    -IuxeUWgBMTH4Xk9QADM
        approved: "1"
        category: "1"
        enabled: "1"
        name: "Fred"
        text: "test message 3"

Answer 1

As @Rima pointed out, key() is the most straightforward way of getting the ID firebase assigned to your push().

If, however, you wish to cut-out the middle-man, Firebase released a gist with their ID generation code. It's simply a function of the current time, which is how they guarantee uniqueness, even w/o communicating w/ the server.

With that, you can use generateId(obj) and set(obj) to replicate the functionality of push()

Here's the ID function:

/**
 * Fancy ID generator that creates 20-character string identifiers with the following properties:
 *
 * 1. They're based on timestamp so that they sort *after* any existing ids.
 * 2. They contain 72-bits of random data after the timestamp so that IDs won't collide with other clients' IDs.
 * 3. They sort *lexicographically* (so the timestamp is converted to characters that will sort properly).
 * 4. They're monotonically increasing.  Even if you generate more than one in the same timestamp, the
 *    latter ones will sort after the former ones.  We do this by using the previous random bits
 *    but "incrementing" them by 1 (only in the case of a timestamp collision).
 */
generatePushID = (function() {
  // Modeled after base64 web-safe chars, but ordered by ASCII.
  var PUSH_CHARS = '-0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ_abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz';

  // Timestamp of last push, used to prevent local collisions if you push twice in one ms.
  var lastPushTime = 0;

  // We generate 72-bits of randomness which get turned into 12 characters and appended to the
  // timestamp to prevent collisions with other clients.  We store the last characters we
  // generated because in the event of a collision, we'll use those same characters except
  // "incremented" by one.
  var lastRandChars = [];

  return function() {
    var now = new Date().getTime();
    var duplicateTime = (now === lastPushTime);
    lastPushTime = now;

    var timeStampChars = new Array(8);
    for (var i = 7; i >= 0; i--) {
      timeStampChars[i] = PUSH_CHARS.charAt(now % 64);
      // NOTE: Can't use << here because javascript will convert to int and lose the upper bits.
      now = Math.floor(now / 64);
    }
    if (now !== 0) throw new Error('We should have converted the entire timestamp.');

    var id = timeStampChars.join('');

    if (!duplicateTime) {
      for (i = 0; i < 12; i++) {
        lastRandChars[i] = Math.floor(Math.random() * 64);
      }
    } else {
      // If the timestamp hasn't changed since last push, use the same random number, except incremented by 1.
      for (i = 11; i >= 0 && lastRandChars[i] === 63; i--) {
        lastRandChars[i] = 0;
      }
      lastRandChars[i]++;
    }
    for (i = 0; i < 12; i++) {
      id += PUSH_CHARS.charAt(lastRandChars[i]);
    }
    if(id.length != 20) throw new Error('Length should be 20.');

    return id;
  };
})();

Answer 2

To get the "name" of any snapshot (in this case, the ID created by push()) just call name() like this:

var name = snapshot.name();

If you want to get the name that has been auto-generated by push(), you can just call name() on the returned reference, like so:

var newRef = myDataRef.push(...);
var newID = newRef.name();

---

NOTE: snapshot.name() has been deprecated. See other answers.